Corrie Ten Boom who survived a German Concentration camp said the following: “In China, the Christians were told, Don’t worry, before the tribulation comes you will be translated-raptured. Then came terrible persecution. Millions of Christians were tortured to death. Later I heard a Bishop from China say, sadly, we have failed. We should have made the people strong for persecution, rather than telling them Jesus would come first. Tell the people how to be strong in times of persecution, how to stand when the tribulation comes -to stand and not faint.”
Most of my adult life I’ve heard the newspaper eschatology and assumed we were in the last days. Truth is, we do not know for sure when it will end. It could be tomorrow, it could be a thousand years. I agree with what the Bishop said, we need to prepare for the hard times that are coming.
The great falling away is not the rapture. But a general abandonment of the faith, which we are clearly seeing.
Well, THE Tribulation as described in Revelation, has not happened yet.
That doesn’t preclude tribulation and persecution in general.
The problem arises by people conflating *tribulation* as in general troubles that we all face in life, with *The Great Tribulation*, aka the Time of Jacob’s Troubles, when God judges the world and restores Israel. That is a specific 7 year event as outlined in Scripture.
So honestly, or not, conflating the two leads to error and deception.
Any Christian telling another to not worry the rapture will take you away before real persecutions is failing completely. Christ literally warns us to expect real and harsh persecution when we take up his cross.
That being said it still does not make the rapture untrue nor less important. The rapture will happen but in my opinion it is more about allowing the world to see what exactly a world without God’s hand involved really would be like.
In my opinion it is yet another mercy of God’s to show the most stubborn just how wrong they are and give one last chance to see how much they need God before the final judgment.
Anyone waiting for the rapture to avoid persecution is failing to understand God’s word but that does not make the rapture untrue nor any less desired. As for the timing of the rapture, while it may be physically important to ones comfort, it is by no means doctrinally necessary for salvation, making many of the arguments over it more harmful than productive.
I counsel those curious to just accept the possibility it could be pre, mid or post and instead have faith God will carry us through regardless of our poor understandings.